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The party, the panic and the trust. Meta-localization for success in localization.

At first, what happens when you want to localize software is similar to being invited to a party where you don’t really know anybody, but everybody else seems to know everybody else. A feeling of awkwardness accompanies your gestures and a nervous smile sticks to your face. Your objective is to mingle and show who you really are to the others, hoping for the opportunity to present your striking ideas and disarming humor. You grow self-aware and every gesture becomes somewhat tense. The more relaxed you want to seem (“I’m totally ok with being here alone looking at the host’s beautiful plants”), the more displaced you feel.

There is no reason to panic. Actually, you only panic if you are not able to reason. So, the best procedures and results will come from organization, clear priorities and efficient planning.

If you built up your software from scratch, dedicated to it, gave it a lot of thought, it means that you believe in it. If it is completed before the localization project takes place, it means that you could orientate your efforts and your means towards an objective. It means you already have demonstrated discipline, as well as coordination and supervising skills. You just need to be able to show it, just as, in the party, your preoccupation is having somebody interacting with you, and be able to communicate your most valuable personal assets. Being aware of the risk does not mean not to take it, but quite the opposite: it means knowing how to arrange the elements that minimize it.

Your software won’t talk for itself. If localization is even necessary, then your finished but “unlocalized” product is not enough. Rather, its quality needs to be perceived by the new market and potential clients through your localization project. This means, in a way, that your product duplicates itself momentarily in order to become a stronger unity after a successful localization. When developing a localization project, you are taking your product as a mean to achieve a (multi) localized successful business. So, trusting your product is key, and that trust is what pushes you into the internationalization or localization of the product in the first place. Finally, if, as we saw, your product happens to be the most important mean with which you are working on your newly established end, you possess all the crucial elements to build up a successful localization plan, by reducing risk and thus maximizing probabilities of success.

Ensure the success of your software localization project. Allocate your resources to proper planning, good quality translation and testing. Multilizer Localization Tool takes care of the technical quality and ease of localization. Try and see it yourself.